Carmen Barillaro

Carmen Barillaro (July 24, 1944 – July 23, 1997) was an Italian-Canadian mobster who served as the right-hand man to Johnny Papalia of the Papalia crime family based in Hamilton, Ontario.

Barillaro was born in Italy and immigrated to Canada with parents at the age of nine.[1] He grew in Niagara Falls, and joined the Papalia family.[1] Barillaro became a "made man" in the Magaddino crime family of Buffalo, New York.[1] In 1978, he was convicted of conspiracy to import heroin and sentenced to two years in prison.[1] Released on parole in 1979, he was convicted of trying to sell three pounds of heroin to an undercover police officer in 1980, causing him to spent the next three years in prison.[1] During his time in prison, Barillaro had bulked up by working out, and upon his release Papalia employed him to exhort money from illegal gambling houses in Toronto's Greektown in the Pape-Danforth area.[1] Considered to be a terrifying figure, Barillaro together with other muscular Mafiosi would raid gambling houses that refused to pay money to Papalia to intimidate and rob the gamblers.[2]  

To launder money for the Papalia family, Barillaro opened up a restaurant-bar in Niagara Falls.[2] Barillaro was an exacting and tyrannical manager who beaten up a cook who tried to defrost a chicken with cold water instead of a microwave as he had ordered.[2] He owned the restaurant-bar via a convoluted ownership structure that was meant to pass himself off as a silent partner as his criminal record made him ineligible to have a liquor license in Ontario.[2] In the 1980s, Sergeant Reginald King of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police made a listing of all 275 Mafiosi in Ontario in order of importance.[2] King placed Papalia as number one and Barillaro as number seven.[2] In 1987, Barillaro hired a woman, Faye Fontaine, to serve as an assassin, saying he wanted Roy Caja, a drug dealer who had once belonged to the Outlaws biker gang, killed for not paying a drug debt.[1] Fontaine ultimately chose not to serve as a hitwoman, and instead turned police informer.[1] On January 24, 1989, Barillaro was sentenced to three years in prison for conspiracy to commit murder.[1]  

Shortly after his release, Barillaro was charged in May 1992 with conspiracy to import several kilograms of cocaine and 900 kilograms of marijuana from the United States.[2] The drug shipment was estimated to be worth $3 million Canadian dollars.[2] Barillaro ended up pleading guilty to conspiracy to import cocaine and was fined $10,000.[2] Barillaro was married with two daughters and always had dinner with his brother every Sunday.[2] He was a devout Catholic who was a close friend of his priest, Father Malachy Smith, who called him a model family man.[2]

On May 31, 1997, Papalia was fatally shot in the head in the parking lot of 20 Railway Street outside his vending machine business in Hamilton. The hitman Kenneth Murdock claimed that he had been ordered to kill Papalia by Angelo and Pat Musitano of the Musitano crime family who owed some $250,000 to Papalia.[3] Two months later, on July 23, 1997, Murdock killed Barillaro with a 9mm handgun after making the comment, "This is a message from Pat". The murder occurred in Barillaro's Niagara Falls home after the victim's wife and children had left. Murdock said that Angelo Musitano was waiting in the vehicle outside during this time. The two then left the scene.[4][5][3][2] Murdock and Barillaro struggled for several minutes before Murdock was able to shoot him.[2] When Barillaro's wife and daughters came home from their shopping trip with Barillaro's birthday presents, they found him lying in a pool of his blood.[2] The motive for the "hit" was self-protection. Pat was convinced that Barillaro would target him in retribution for the Papalia killing, so he and Murdock acted first.[6]

In November 1998, Murdock pleaded guilty to three counts of second degree murder, was sentenced to life imprisonment, and named Pat and Angelo as the men who had ordered the murders; he was released on parole after serving 13 years.[7][8][9] In February 2000, the brothers were sentenced to 10 years for conspiracy in the murder of Barillaro in a plea bargain arrangement. No conviction was obtained in relation to the murder of Papalia.[10] In October 2006, the Musitano brothers were both released from prison.[11][12] After Murdock had served 13 years in prison, he was granted day parole in December 2011, before full parole in 2014.[7][8] After release from prison, he relocated to British Columbia and works as a truck driver under his changed surname, Bishop.[5][13]